Nomura poaches new head of equities from Citi

Nomura is fast-emerging as one of the most active recruiters of senior bankers in 2014, and has just poached Ronan Connolly, who was previously head of equities for Europe, the Middle East and Africa at Citi.

Connolly takes the same position at Nomura and is the latest in a series of new hires this year, including Todd Sandoz as global head of equity trading and execution services from Credit Suisse and Mike Ward as head of equity sales for EMEA, who joined from Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Connolly has held senior positions across a variety of large investment banks. Before joining Citi in 2009, he was head of single-stock derivatives flow at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Nomura’s equity division underwent significant changes over the past 18 months. In September 2012, it announced that its subsidiary brokerage agency, Instinet, would become Nomura’s execution arm and then in December it said that it would combine its equities and fixed income units. A number of senior Lehman Brothers equities bankers, who joined when Nomura acquired its European business, departed. Among then was Sam Ruiz, who headed the bank’s European equities team.

Nomura confirmed Connolly’s appointment.

While Nomura’s equities hires are more of a re-build than expansion, the Japanese bank is among a few firms willing to invest in senior staff currently. Earlier this month it also hired Ramon Balje and Craig Butterworth as managing directors in its fixed income sales team and added Paddy Power and Henry McWatter in senior sales roles earlier this year.